


a thousand armies couldn't keep me out

by MissMorphine



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: #sylvixweek2019, But not Graphic Violence, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, Sylvix Week (Fire Emblem), Sylvix Week 2019
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-16
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-12-20 20:24:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21062669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissMorphine/pseuds/MissMorphine
Summary: (Set during the five year time skip)Felix receives a letter from Margrave Gautier that Sylvain has been captured by the Imperial army.Sylvix Week, Day 3 (okay I'm a day late but I'm pretending that it isn't): modern au | fairytales |letters





	a thousand armies couldn't keep me out

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from "Seven Devils" by Florence + the Machine.
> 
> Prepare to suspend your disbelief because we're going for a happy ending here

The letter arrived with the seal of Gautier.

That should have been the first sign that something was wrong. Sylvain’s letters to Felix never bore an official seal. As Felix broke the seal, his heart dropped. It wasn’t a letter from Sylvain. It was a letter from Margrave Gautier.

_Lord Fraldarius,_

_The Imperial army will soon be at your doorstep. They have overrun the Gautier territory, and their troops now occupy our land. They have sent a message demanding our complete surrender. My heir, Sylvain, was injured in the battle and has not returned. To ensure our compliance, the Imperial army has sent word that they will return my heir in exchange for our surrender._

_Know that we do not plan to surrender._

Felix crumpled the letter in his fist. He didn’t bother to read the rest of the letter; it was nothing more than military strategies. The swordsman was furious as he stormed into his father’s drawing room and slammed the letter onto the table in front of Lord Rodrigue. The lord sighed as he finished reading the letter. He looked up at his son and gave him a pitying look.

“Sylvain was important to you,” said Rodrigue. “This loss must weigh heavy on your heart.” Felix scowled.

“Don’t act like he’s already dead,” growled Felix. The look of pity in his father’s eyes disgusted him.

“I went through this same process of losing a dear friend when King Lambert died.” As his father stood up, perhaps to comfort him, Felix backed away.

“Sylvain isn’t dead!” Felix snapped. He closed his eyes to center himself. “Don’t compare me with you. You know nothing about how I feel, old man.” _A dear friend_, the words almost made Felix want to laugh. What he felt for Sylvain was far deeper than mere friendship.

Felix felt his hands itching for a sword. His blood was screaming for him to go out and _do something _for Sylvain. It was in this moment that Felix wished that the professor was still around; she would already have had a plan formulated to save Sylvain. Lord Rodrigue shook his head, as if knowing what Felix was about to ask.

“Do not do anything rash, Felix,” warned Rodrigue. “I know that you do not want to give up on Sylvain, but we cannot afford to lose any troops if Margrave Gautier’s warnings are true. We will need every man to fight to defend our territory.” The unspoken words hung in the air. His father was not willing to help him recover Sylvain.

“If it were Dimitri who was captured…” Felix allowed himself to trail off.

“The prince’s safety is paramount…” argued Rodrigue. “It would be our duty to our liege to do all in our power to ensure his safety.”

Felix gave his father a repulsed look before turning on his heel without a word. He stormed out through the drawing room doors and toward the armory. Various weapons lined the walls, but one in particular caught Felix’s eye. The swordsman picked up the Sword of Moralta and pulled it from its sheath. He sliced through the air once before putting the blade back into the scabbard and fixing it around his waist.

On his way out of the armory, the Shield of Aegis caught his eye. Without hesitation, Felix grabbed the shield. He was still latching the shield onto his arm as he ran out to the stables to find his father’s fastest horse. Although he couldn’t ride as well as Sylvain and certainly couldn’t battle atop a horse, he was skilled enough to ride into Gautier territory.

As Felix crossed the border from Fraldarius territory into Gautier lands, he did not look back. If his father was unwilling to help him, then he would do this alone.

Finding the Imperial army was not a difficult challenge. The smoke from their fires, built because their soldiers were unused to the frigid temperatures of northern Faerghus, made their location known from miles away. Felix stopped just outside the camp and tied the horse’s reins to the trunk of a tree. He couldn’t risk being caught, and a horse was too conspicuous to bring into the enemy camp, even if it would make for a quicker escape.

Felix checked the bottles of vulneraries at his side to ensure that none had cracked or leaked. He tried to remember the professor’s advice about hostages. Logically, he knew that Sylvain wouldn’t be on the outskirts of the camp; it would be too easy for him to escape.

When night fell and a pair of Imperial soldiers took the second watch, it was time to strike. Felix was quick, quicker than both of the soldiers, and they went down before they could even sound the alarm. He pulled the armor off one of the soldiers and put it on; it felt unsettling to wear the Imperial armor, but it would get him through the camp more easily.

Felix was wary as he walked through the camp. There were enough soldiers there for him to blend in, but it was a small enough battalion that they would recognize an unfamiliar face. As Felix looked around at the identical tents, his frustration grew.

“Do you need a vulnerary?” asked one soldier to another. The soldier had just stepped out of a tent; he was nursing a broken nose and looked furious about it.

“I don’t want a vulnerary,” growled the soldier, “I want to kill that fucking redheaded dastard. When is Emperor Edelgard going to give us the order to kill him?” Felix held his breath. There was only one redhead foolish enough to break his captor’s nose. He waited for the pair of soldiers -- the one still complaining that Sylvain had headbutted him and broken his nose -- to leave before slipping into the tent that they had just left.

Felix’s heart caught in his throat. Sylvain was kneeling before him with his hands tied behind his back and his ankle tied together. There was a strip of fabric tied around his head, serving as a gag, and dried blood covered his face. As the redhead saw him, the fury in his eyes ignited; he began to thrash, trying his damnedest to break free of his bonds.

“Sylvain!” hissed Felix in a low whisper. He took off the Imperial helmet and threw it to the ground. As soon as the helmet was off, Sylvain stopped moving. He looked like his heart had stopped completely. Felix reached out to pull the gag out of Sylvain’s mouth.

“Felix…” whispered Sylvain, his voice cracking. “You can’t be here. Goddess, I must be dying…” Felix knelt down in front of Sylvain and took the other male’s face in his hands to force the other to look at him.

“I’m here,” said Felix. “I’m here, and we need to get out of here.” He pulled a small dagger from his belt and began to saw at the ropes binding Sylvain’s wrists. He handed the dagger over to Sylvain to allow him to cut his own legs free while the swordsman took out a vulnerary.

Sylvain exchanged the dagger for the vulnerary and quickly uncorked the bottle. He gulped down the contents -- Felix reflected that he must be dehydrated as well as injured -- and dropped the bottle onto the ground.

“You shouldn’t have come here,” Sylvain said. “I can’t be the reason that you die, Felix. I’m only going to slow you down.” Felix grabbed onto Sylvain’s shirt and fisted his hands into the fabric. He pulled Sylvain closer, as if he was going to hit him, before resting his head on the taller male’s chest.

“Did you forget our promise?” asked Felix, his tone rough. “You swore to me that we would die together. I’m not letting you out of this promise, so stop wasting our time and get up.” Felix stood up and held out a hand expectantly. Sylvain looked Felix in the eyes before grasping his hand and allowing himself to be pulled to his feet. He stumbled slightly and pressed a hand to his side before murmuring that he would be fine.

Felix put the helmet back on before stepping out of the tent. He looked around to see if any Imperial soldiers were still milling about the camp. The camp was empty, but the third watch was likely to start soon. The amount of time they had left was rapidly dwindling.

As Felix reentered the tent, he realized that he had no plan for how they would escape the Imperial army camp. He put his head in his hands and fought the urge to slice something. He wasn’t a strategist; he trained with a blade, not with his mind. Felix kept his eyes on the ground to avoid looking at Sylvain; he knew that Sylvain must have realized their situation.

“Felix,” began Sylvain, “I have an idea, but you need to trust me.” Felix looked wary but nodded nonetheless. “At the edge of camp, there’s a supply tent. You need to leave me behind--” Felix was about to protest, but Sylvain continued on. “--and set it on fire. Once it starts to burn, they’ll be distracted by the fire, and we’ll have a chance to get out of here.” Felix hated the idea of leaving Sylvain; there were too many variables, too many possibilities that would get Sylvain killed, but he knew that it was the best plan they had without an army to back them up.

Felix stepped out of the tent once more and walked toward the edge of camp where Sylvain said the supply tent would be. There were fires burning everywhere. Felix tamped down a smirk; the Imperial army had no ability to handle the cold, and that was going to work in his favor. He wrapped the fabric that had been used as Sylvain’s gag around a stick and stuck it into the fire. Once it was burning, Felix entered the supply tent.

There wasn’t much time for Felix to work. He set the burning branch against the side of the tent and waited for the canvas to catch fire. Once it began to burn, he grabbed the bottles of disinfectant and poured them onto the ground with a hope that they were flammable. Smoke began to fill the tent, and Felix sliced through the back of the tent to slip away.

Soldiers began to shout as they noticed the plume of smoke at the edge of their camp. The flames had spread to the next tent, an unintended boon. Just as Sylvain had predicted, the men began to panic as the tent went down in flames. Chaos reigned throughout the camp as some soldiers ran toward the fire and others away.

Felix cut through the back panel of the tent that was holding Sylvain. His eyes widened in horror as he saw an Imperial soldier, the one with the broken nose, stepping on Sylvain’s ribs. The soldier reached to draw his blade, but Felix was quicker. The soldier’s sword had barely gotten out of the scabbard by the time Felix’s sword had pierced his chest.

With a wheeze, Sylvain pulled at the soldier’s legs and sent him to the ground. Felix grabbed Sylvain’s hands and yanked him to his feet. They nearly stumbled over each other as they slipped through the crack Felix had created with his sword.

As they ran through the trees, Felix prayed that his horse was still there. If Felix had been a religious man, he would have sent a prayer to the goddess as he heard the horse whinny. He slashed at the knot in the reins, too impatient to untie it properly.

Felix put one foot into the saddle and a hand on the pommel as he pulled himself up, more awkwardly that he would have liked. He swung his leg around before reaching down to help Sylvain. Even injured, Sylvain was still more graceful getting onto the horse than Felix was.

With a nudge of Felix’s heels, the horse took off back in the direction of Fraldarius territory. It wasn’t until they had crossed the border into his homeland that Felix finally let himself breathe. He leaned back in relief, accidentally leaning onto Sylvain’s chest behind him.

Felix cursed himself as he felt his heart skip a beat. It was Sylvain’s touch that sent Felix’s pulse racing the hardest, even more than the exhilarating terror of invading an enemy camp and setting it aflame.

“Why did you come for me?” asked Sylvain. If there was one thing Felix was grateful for about their position on the horse, it was that he was able to face forward instead of looking at Sylvain for this conversation.

“I told you,” began Felix, “I wasn’t going to let you out of our promise. You’re not allowed to die.” _And leave me alone._ The words hovered in the air, unspoken but still heard. Felix started as he felt Sylvain’s arms wrap around his waist, but he slowly settled.

“Thank you,” Sylvain murmured in Felix’s ear. “It was a dangerous and foolish choice, and I would have never forgiven you if you died trying to save me…but thank you.” Felix could hear the underlying message in the words, and he was now regretting that he couldn’t see Sylvain’s face.

Felix pulled the reins to bring the horse to a stop. He twisted around in the saddle to face Sylvain as best he could; he reached up and grasped the back of Sylvain’s head to bring their lips together. As far as first kisses went, it wasn’t the most comfortable. Felix’s back was protesting the strange position he had put himself in, but he couldn’t be bothered to think of anything else while his lips were attached to Sylvain’s.

As the kiss broke, Felix untwisted himself to face forward in the saddle once again. He nudged the horse forward and hoped that Sylvain wasn’t able to see the blush that was burning its way up to his ears. Felix allowed himself to lean back against Sylvain once again as the sun began to break and they continued up the path home.

**Author's Note:**

> Sylvain: Felix we still need to talk about the fact that you kissed me
> 
> (don't worry they do talk about it)
> 
> Also, I didn't plan to make Rodrigue unsympathetic here. I mean, he's not exactly wrong; he's being logical about the fact that rescuing Sylvain is too risky, and I feel like it is in character for him, but it still isn't a sympathetic action.


End file.
